NEW TRACTOR

Wairarapa Times-Age, 4 January 1940, Page 3

NEW TRACTOR

DESIGN FOR SMALL FARMERS. SOME NOVEL FEATURES. Steadily and irrevocably mechanical contrivances are replacing labour in primary production. An American once said that it is a fool who kills his own job. The job of the harvester has been largely killed in New Zealand — the header is taking his place. There are still a few old hands left who remember the hostility of farm workers to the introduction into Canterbury of the reaper and binder, the first of which had to be guarded at night in case some resentful harvester damaged them. In those days the harvester was afraid of being pushed out, of his job. Today there is no pushing—life in other walks is more attractive. An objection to the general use of the tractor in the past has been that a farm must comprise a definite area of tillable land to make a machine an economic unit. If not, such a machine became little more than a lazy man's toy. But an entirely new design of tractor is to be placed on the Australian market after the New Year which, it is claimed, will entirely get over this difficulty. It is to be a small man's machine, so constructed that it will combine with the working of implements with maximum afficiency. It is not a new model but a new design.

It is understood that this new rub-ber-tyred tractor will have all the features of the conventional four-wheel tractor, combined with all the features of the small or all-purpose type of tractor. All the best features of the conventional tractor have been maintained for hauling the regular types of implements, and in addition there has been incorporated in this tractor the manoeuvrability of the small type witli individual rear-wheel brakes to ensure a short turning radius. Perhaps the outstanding feature of the design is the mounting of the power plant, which allows the operator to have an unobstructed front and rear view of the implement, being operated. It has been the custom to design tractors more or less as a power plant, and then set about designing the various types of implements to be hauled. This process has now been reversed. The new tractor has been designed around the various implements which are to be hauled, keeping in mind that tractors are of very little value without proper implements to go with them. The essential idea is to make the tractor serve as the wheels and the main frames of the implements wherever possible. It has been found that implements so designed can be produced cheaper and will have a far greater utility. This kind of equip-

ment will be designed to meet the needs of a larger number of presentday small farms as yet uncatered for by an economical and efficient tractor unit. Orchardists, pastoralists, mixed farmers, dairy farmers, and various row-crop farmers and potato and onion growers are contemplating modern equipment. Another novel feature incorporated in this new tractor is its versatility of working speeds.. A new device will permit of almost any desired speed between H and 4J miles an hour. The fact that a speed can be selected which will permit the most efficient work to be done by the implement should prove of great value to the operator. In addition to these various adjustable working speeds, a speed of 10 miles an hour has been provided for speedy transportation around the farm and on the road.